GREAT MOMENTS IN PHISHTORY
Sometimes it can be hard to be a die-hard Phish fan when the boys aren’t touring because it seems that everyone is a critic. Between Fantasy Tour, phish.net and other online fan forums and podcasts, not to mention articles and other fan based reviews, there can be a great deal of negativity about the band and the Phish scene from fans turned critics. It starts to feel like you need to defend your favorite band from its own fans, which is why it is important to remember why we LOVE this band and why it is still worth going to as many shows as you can possibly attend!
With this goal in mind, I am proud to introduce a new forum for Phish fans called Great Moments in Phishtory! GMP will be a place for us to share stories about being on the road and seeing the boys in all their glory. Not only will there be stories about how great they played, but about the moments when the world disappeared and all that was left was the music and everything just made sense. There will also be stories about the Phish community and how we make tours work for each other -- that time when someone was broken down on the side of the road and was miraculously saved by another touring stranger, or that time when you were completely broke and someone gave you a miracle ticket for the best show you ever saw, better yet, the day you reunited with your long lost best friend right when your favorite song began. Great Moments in Phishtory will be a regular feature on my blog: centralpartoftownpins.blogspot.com and I hope that people will contribute more stories and participate in the discussion so that we can come together and remember why this is not only the best band ever -- but an amazing community of nomadic music phanatics!
Phish Pheeding Phrenzy
Ever since the Phish Reunion at Hampton Coliseum in March of 2009, I’ve had a dear friend who works for the ticketing company that makes all of the mail order lottery tickets. He has been very generous with me and makes sure that I get the returned and unused mail order tickets that are left over after tours and runs. It is a fun collection to have and has grown to be an impressive size at this point.
At the Halloween show in Indio during Festival 8, I brought the collection out with me for trick-or-treats; I had over 100 unused mail order tickets by that point. For Halloween I was dressed as the Bride of Frankenstein with a thrift store wedding dress and my large hair twisted up on top of my head that night. Of course the dress had no pockets so I tucked the large pile of tickets from Hampton and Summer 09 tour into my cleavage for “safe keeping”.
Now, I don’t need to tell all of you fans out there that the boys went as the Rolling Stones that Halloween and played Exile on Mainstreet with Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings as a backup that night. The show was absolutely stellar, with a particularly awesome Lovin’ Cup during the Stone’s set. I was so excited to be there and was just having a grand time all night long! Still, the costumed set paled in comparison to the last set of the night with all of pyrotechnics and a setlist I will remember for the rest of my days. One of the best parts of the last set was that Sharon Jones and her gorgeous diva backup singers stayed on and just wailed our favorite Phish songs.
When the setlist got to Suzie Greenburg, I don’t think I was prepared to have my mind blown. Suzie is always a fun song, but a regular rotation song, far from that “Holy Grail” category of rare songs we Phans are always seeking. Still, there it was: The sickest Suzie the boys have ever played (in my humble opinion). Right in the middle of the song, they stepped back and handed the mic to Sharon Jones and her backup and they tore Suzie to shreds. It was a soulful scat jam that would have made even the great Ella Fitzgerald shake her hips and I just got lost.
When the boys stepped back up to the mic, the anticipation was almost painful. We were all waiting for that big SUZAE-SUZAE-SUZAE-SUZAE!!!! and when we got it, I leaped up into the air with my hands above my head -- I was thrilled! The big leap caused the huge stack of mail order tickets stashed in the front of my dress to fly up into the air and flutter back down in a huge spray over the crowd. All of a sudden someone yelled, “TICKETS!!!!”.
Tickets for the Hampton reunion and first summer tour back were expensive and hard to get; I think people thought the tickets were for upcoming shows. One way or the other people were diving to the ground and shoving people out of the way to get at the tickets as they came slowly down over the crowd. I don’t think even cash money would have gotten that big of a reaction at that moment. It literally was a Phish Pheeding Phrenzy as people all around my section dove and scrambled to get their hands on the scattered tickets and all the while Suzie was raging in the background.
It was a Phish moment I never will forget. The image of a huge section of people just hitting the ground and scrambling for tickets was like something out of a movie and it still gives me a belly laugh to this day. I still have a good friend who gives me tickets after tours and runs are over so I usually bring them to shows to share with people who want to fill in the gaps of their tour ticket collection. Stop me and ask to see them if you ever catch me in the lot!
POLL: What was the BEST Suzie Greenburg ever played? (you already know my vote)
visit centralpartoftownpins.blogspot.com to cast your vote -- and don’t forget to include your reasons why!
